


supplicating mild and meek

by catbeans



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: M/M, Trans Jaskier | Dandelion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-02-23 06:42:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23107252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catbeans/pseuds/catbeans
Summary: He had to stop himself from fidgeting.“You don’t have to—”“I don’t exactly have a lot of options,” Jaskier said; Geralt bit back a low sound at Jaskier’s thumb digging into another knot, “and you need your arm up and working again.”Geralt wished he hadn’t thought of another option. He had managed not to for a while.The smell of whatever Jaskier had put on his hands was familiar. Even without the tub, even without a room, the feeling was, too, the passive sense of Jaskier behind him and the tightness in his stomach. He felt bare again.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 23
Kudos: 429





	supplicating mild and meek

**Author's Note:**

> i only know the show and i was as confused by the timeline as i was focused on how tight geralts pants were which is probably reflected in this. bone app the teeth. jaskier is trans because i like him. the title is from caligula by gawain and the green knight

It started like a hum, a tune in his chest that was still forming but forming whether he wanted it to or not, until it forced itself out of his mouth; it needed a different voice.

He left, asked around, found someone who could help him and would. When Jaskier left again, the tune sounded right a pitch lower.

He felt right a pitch lower, too, how he moved and how his clothes moved with him. He could have been a little more economical with that part of it, soaking up the way people looked and the  _ lightness _ to it, but as long as the rest of his songs left him enough for a meal and somewhere to sleep, he couldn’t see much reason not to enjoy himself.

Jaskier set his lute down next to him on the rock he had been sitting on since the sun had been higher and stretched his back with a  _ pop _ and a huff.

It had been a while.

He glanced down at a movement by his leg, flicking away a bug with another huff at the smear it left when he had mostly just squished it. The red spot didn’t stand out enough from the fabric to stain, at least, he figured.

“He’s just taking his time, now, isn’t he?”

Roach looked off to the other side.

“He has to be done by now…”

Jaskier’s ankle bounced a few times before he stood up, hesitating for a minute with his hands on his hips before packing his lute in its case to leave on one of the saddlebags.

“You’ll be fine here for a minute.”

Geralt’s footsteps were still sunken into the mud, a few slashed vines leaving his path clear enough not to lose as Jaskier stepped over the craggly, uneven slope downward. He couldn’t see very far through the dense trees.

“Geralt?” he called out, before he winced and stopped to listen; there were no snapping branches, no footsteps coming towards him, and no answer. Jaskier frowned and started walking again unaware to how he might not have been able to if he had decided to leave Roach a little earlier.

Farther through the trees, far enough that Jaskier’s voice didn’t reach, the sky spun and the ground swayed.

The poison wouldn’t set in enough to fully take effect; it still had enough time to start between the creature’s claws digging into his shoulder just as he had thrust his sword up into its belly and shoving it off of him, pushing himself upright but not getting very far before he stumbled to his knees.

The haze prickling over him almost covered the  _ burning _ sting in his shoulder, but not enough. The crumpled corpse melted into the background of green and brown and blue sky, the twinkling sound of birds leaving him feeling disjointed and disconnected from the dark, thick blood on his hands and his own soaking the back of his shirt under the leather. He didn’t think it would have ended like that, so uneventfully and so brightly with the forest settling right back into its routine around him. For him, at least, comparatively, it felt so mundane.

The ground was damp under his knees. Red hair blurred ahead of him.

He didn’t feel his mouth move, didn’t feel the sound in his throat, but he heard, “Ma.”

The ground was damp under his back, then, too; the blue sky dimmed.

“Roach!” Jaskier shouted, as much breath behind it as he could muster with his lungs aching from the strain of hauling Geralt from the shallow valley.  _ “Roach! _ It would be  _ incredibly _ helpful if you—oh, what in hell do you eat, Geralt…”

Roach only blinked at him when Jaskier finally made it over the last slope. Jaskier huffed again and adjusted Geralt’s less-mangled arm over his shoulder, bloody hair brushing his cheek as Geralt’s head slumped against his.

“Look how close we are now, you’re  _ fine,” _ Jaskier said, hurrying as much as he could with all the weight holding him down, Geralt’s legs barely straight, let alone holding him. “Can practically see all your weird bottles of stuff from here.”

Geralt’s mouth moved, silent, but in the same shape as the other times it hadn’t been. It twisted oddly in Jaskier’s chest. He wouldn’t have expected to, but he had never heard Geralt mention his mother. It didn’t make him optimistic that Geralt would then.

“Did you know?”

“I knew you were taking longer than I felt like waiting,” Jaskier said to Geralt’s croak. “Now, uh—can you sit? Up? Sit down.”

Geralt let out a sound unsettlingly, uncharacteristically small as Jaskier bent his knees to lower him against the same rock he had been sitting on before. Geralt’s arm slipped limply from Jaskier’s shoulders as soon as Jaskier let go of him, careful to lean him on his better side, but it still got him a strangled grunt and a wince before he scrambled up again.

Geralt’s eyes didn’t follow Jaskier to Roach, dazed and unfocused on the sun-haloed leaves above him; there was a twinkling again, glass that time, dirt under the backs of his fingers—he had lost his glove, he had lost his glove, bare hands, sensitive and vulnerable—before a shadow blocked the fuzzy green.

His eyes didn’t focus.

“Ma.”

A hand gripped the front of his collar. Geralt let himself be pulled forward, into something soft, his face warmed not from the sun, and he breathed into it.

“Sorry to disappoint,” Jaskier said, little thought to the hair catching in his mouth with Geralt slumped against him, or the grime smudging his neck from Geralt’s face turned to his collar; he didn’t see another way to reach Geralt’s back without risking him toppling over, and there was enough fresh blood on the rock. “I think you’ll be able to make do with me, though, we can get this right—”

Jaskier tipped the small bottle he had taken from Roach’s saddlebag.

He felt the shout in Geralt’s chest against his, his whole body tensing so suddenly and violently that it almost knocked Jaskier over instead before—

_ “Fuck!” _

Jaskier touched his side before he opened his eyes, dirt scraping the back of his head; it took him a second to register the punch, another few to register that his ribs were all in one piece, but he was already pushing himself up.

“Geralt.”

His eyes flashed panic-wide, his hand limp in his lap where it had dropped from Jaskier’s side. They followed, that time, when Jaskier gingerly sat up on his knees again, slowly, keeping his hands low but visible as he shuffled closer.

“You need to let me see it,” he said, raising one hand towards Geralt’s shoulder but no closer yet. “I’m sure once you stop calling me your mother you would be angrier with me for not doing this than you’re going to be now for…doing this, if you were alive, but you look like a stuck pig, so I’m starting to doubt that you would be.”

Geralt’s nose twitched as he spoke, eyes darting over his face, but his breathing slowed, and as soon as it did, Jaskier had to lunge for his collar to keep Geralt from scraping against the rock as he slumped again.

“Yeah, I thought so…” Jaskier had to gently peel back shreds of leather hanging over,  _ “Oh, _ that’s disgusting.”

He didn’t see anything inside the two deep gashes in Geralt’s shoulder, any dirt fizzled away by whatever was in the bottle. He hoped. The blood didn’t make it easy to get a good look.

“Alright…”

He had to lean Geralt’s other side against the rock to run back to Roach for some bandages; the shadows were already stretching long ahead of them, the chittering of birds replaced by crickets by the time he managed to haul Geralt onto Roach. He stood there for a second, Roach standing still and Geralt already wobbling, before he sighed and got on in front of him for Geralt to slump against his back. He didn’t think he would be able to lift Geralt like that a second time.

Jaskier didn’t nudge Roach to start walking until Geralt’s arm tightened a little around his waist, his breathing slow and strained at the back off Jaskier’s neck.

“I don’t need you to  _ bathe _ me—”

Jaskier smacked his arm down before Geralt could try to take the damp cloth from him.

Getting Geralt’s clothes off had been more trouble than Jaskier would have expected, all those buckles and layers, harder still doing it through the wincing and strained sounds that felt too small to be coming from him; Jaskier wasn’t planning on saying so, but it had gotten a little easier when those sounds had turned to irritated grunts and snapping at him which bottle treated what.

He had gotten himself into the bath, at least, the daze still in his eyes clearing not long after Jaskier had emptied the last bottle down his back, but the ease ended there.

“Because you can reach so well yourself,” Jaskier said. “I’m not cleaning that off for you so you can take a bath and just get it all grimy again.” He stepped to the back of the tub to untangle the thin strip of leather holding Geralt’s hair back. “So I would have to clean it out  _ again.” _

Geralt grunted and settled a little lower into the tub.

Flecks of dried blood still caked his skin until Jaskier gently dabbed it away with the cloth, squeezing it into a spare bowl to keep the hot water a little cleaner a little longer. The muscles in Geralt’s neck tensed with each soft push of the cloth the closer he got to the twin gashes, hesitating over a persistent smear before he licked his thumb to wipe it clean.

“Do you have enough bandages to wrap this or do you think I’ll need to get more?”

“It needs stitches.”

Jaskier’s hand went still a couple inches above Geralt’s back. “What?”

“Did you not hear—?”

“I’ve never given someone stitches.”

“Because I can reach so well myself,” Geralt said slowly. “It only needs a couple. I know you don’t stop at a tailor every time you shred something.”

“A  _ couple, _ I—no, I don’t, but a shirt doesn’t try to knock you out when you—”

“What?”

Jaskier cringed; he should have expected Geralt not to remember, if Geralt hadn’t even been able to recognize him then.

“It seemed like you took some issue with the disinfectant,” Jaskier said, leaving the cloth on the side of the tub to get a bottle of soap. “Though I can see now how you got yourself mauled today, you didn’t even break anything, just off your game…”

Jaskier didn’t think anything of it when Geralt didn’t respond as he squeezed some of the soap onto the top of Geralt’s head, didn’t connect the lift of his shoulders with a deep breath to speak until he lifted another bucket.

“I’m sorry—”

Jaskier almost didn’t hear it over the  _ splash _ as he turned the bucket over, his eyebrows twitching up with the last drops plinking into the water around Geralt as he turned it upright again just before the last of it would pour out.

He hesitated for a second before scrubbing the freshly bubbling soap into Geralt’s scalp.

“You didn’t break anything,” he said again; he didn’t say anything about who Geralt had mistaken him for.

Geralt grunted again, a little too soft to sound irritated as Jaskier combed out the muddy tangles with his fingers. Geralt swallowed when Jaskier tied his hair up again to get to his upper back unobstructed, his hands almost uncomfortably soft under calloused fingertips. His stomach flipped a little. He should have had Jaskier get them something to eat first.

It flipped a little more when he tried to remember what Jaskier had said, a shirt not trying to knock him out, and couldn’t. He remembered the claws and the feeling of his sword sinking into flesh, an adult where he had expected a baby; the haze of red and flashes of Roach’s hooves on dirt, a smell that settled warmly behind his eyes; he didn’t remember much else until Jaskier had started undressing him.

The throbbing in his shoulder stayed dull with Jaskier careful not to get too close to it. He scrubbed the sweat and grime and soap from the nape of Geralt’s neck and down, and he hadn’t fully noticed Jaskier’s other hand at the center of his back until he moved it to cup over the wound, scrubbed a little more gently higher on Geralt’s shoulder. 

Geralt let out a deep breath and tried not to relax into it so much. The water was warm and Jaskier’s hands were so steady, circling knots out of his back that had been there too long to notice until they weren’t. He barely noticed himself wince, either, at the cloth scraping over a bruise still starting to form.

“Stitches,” Geralt reminded him, and he didn’t have to see to hear the cringe behind him.

“I’m not done yet.”

“You’re not done yet or you’re not done putting it off?”

“Neither.”

The backs of Jaskier’s fingers brushed over Geralt’s upper arm as he got up, glancing into and quickly away from the tub. A cork popped and Geralt didn’t have time to ask before something sweet and sleepy tinted the air.

“This feels more appropriate for romancing than medicine.”

“This doesn’t need to be any more fuck-awful than it already is,” Jaskier said as he sat behind Geralt again.  _ “I _ don’t need this to be any more fuck-awful than…sit up a little straighter?”

Geralt stifled another wince as he pushed himself higher.

He didn’t expect it enough to stifle a sharp inhale at Jaskier’s hand warm at his back again, thickly wet with that sleepy smell rubbing into his skin just above the water. Jaskier’s hand stilled for a second but not long enough to comment on, slathering the bruise before the stool scraped as he stood up again.

Geralt’s head didn’t move as his eyes tracked Jaskier from the side of the tub to the front, the crease twitching between Jaskier’s eyebrows and the sour shape of his mouth before he shook his head to himself and dipped his fingers into the cup of his palm.

“You made a mess of yourself out there,” he muttered, firmly avoiding eye contact as he traced his middle and forefinger over the ridge of Geralt’s eyebrow, around and above his cheekbone.

“I don’t need—”

“That looks like it’s going to start swelling.” Jaskier smeared the rest of the thick liquid from his fingers onto Geralt’s cheek as he stood up again. “I don’t need to be singing of your exploits only for someone to turn around and see that I’m singing about some puffy purple lug. I’m getting us something to eat, won’t be a moment.”

_ “Stitches—” _

“Hold  _ on, _ Geralt!”

The door slammed behind him before Geralt could tell him to get on with it.

Geralt huffed and settled into the tub as deep as he could without his shoulder getting wet. His bruise-stained knees poked up above the water as he swiped his cheek dry of whatever Jaskier had wiped off on him, his eyes narrowing for a second before he rubbed it into those bruises, too.

No need to waste it like Jaskier had, he thought.

Jaskier was back quickly enough with a plate in each hand that he almost dropped to get the door open, nudging it shut again with his hip and kicking the stool back to the side of the tub.

“Not that I’m enjoying the circumstances around it,” Jaskier said, balancing his plate on his knees and holding the other out for Geralt, “but I am enjoying eating something I didn’t have to watch you skin an hour ago.”

With Jaskier on his better side, Geralt reached for the plate, but he didn’t get very far before he had to bite back a hiss.

“Oh, okay, wait, hold on.”

Jaskier took the plates again and nudged the stool to the other side; Geralt didn’t have to twist to reach there, but he still didn’t have much more success than the first time, and he didn’t have much of a chance to try before Jaskier stood up again.

“Are you  _ serious—” _

“One second! If I have to stitch that thing, you’re not pulling it any wider.”

“Then hurry up and stitch it,” Geralt muttered, but Jaskier either didn’t hear him or didn’t care as he left the plates on the small bed to pull a drawer out of its cabinet.

“There we are.”

Geralt stared at him; Jaskier smiled back over the drawer turned upside-down on his lap as a tray for the plates.

Jaskier held out a chunk of bread with some stew scooped into the crust, close to his mouth before Geralt was able to snatch it out of his hand without lifting his arm too much.

“Just trying to—”

“It would be  _ helpful _ if you—”

“I’ll stitch you up once I don’t get lightheaded just looking at it, unless you like unsteady hands.”

Geralt huffed and let Jaskier hand his food over until both of their plates were empty. Jaskier’s nose wrinkled before he took a deep breath and put the drawer back, plates on top.

“What am I doing?”

“Second pocket in the satchel.”

“Oh, I hate this, I hate this…” 

Geralt couldn’t see Jaskier from the tub, just the nervous mumbling behind him and the shuffling of Jaskier’s hands in the bag. His cheekbone felt a little tingly with whatever Jaskier had put around his eye.

Jaskier brought the whole bag with him when he moved the stool back around behind Geralt, a deep breath before he flipped it open.

“I need the—”

Jaskier didn’t need any more of an excuse to rush up from the stool and away from looking at the gash on Geralt’s shoulder, back again with a mug of strong ale that he took a quick swig from before giving to Geralt.

Geralt downed most of it in one go before, “You need the thicker needle for this one.”

Jaskier audibly cringed behind him before Geralt heard the spool of thread unwinding.

“Do you need me to put anything on it first?”

“Just get on with it, you’re the one dragging this out.”

“Because I don’t want to do this at all,” Jaskier mumbled as he threaded the needle with a shudder. “Are you sure you don’t want to go to a—?”

“We don’t have money for a healer and a room.”

“Well,  _ excuse _ me,” Jaskier said, another deep breath as he lifted his hand to Geralt’s shoulder, “for not leaving you in a barn.”

Geralt finished the last of the ale and braced himself; Jaskier’s hand didn’t move any farther.

“Jaskier—”

“I’m getting there.”

“You need your eyes open.”

“How do you even—fine, fine, oh, this is horrible…”

It had only really been a guess until Jaskier had confirmed it.

“Jaskier.”

Jaskier doubled over himself to muffle a little screechy sound against the bag before straightening up again a few seconds later, smacking his palms to his cheeks a couple times.

“Okay.”

Jaskier needed more reassurance to finish with the needle than Geralt did with it sticking in and sliding through, the drag of the thread and the sticking again until Geralt’s skin felt hot and prickly all over, slow heartbeat thumping a little harder.

“You’re doing fine, Jaskier.”

_ “Don’t _ tell me this is fine when you’re bleeding all over me.”

It would have been quicker if he had been able to reach; the little scissors clattered to the floor when Jaskier tied off the last stitch and snipped the ends.

“Oh,” he breathed out, his head sagging to his lap again. “That was disgusting.”

“You did fine.”

“It was disgusting,” he repeated. “I could  _ feel _ it—ugh, wouldn’t have minded going without that experience…”

Geralt still buzzed with leftover adrenaline while Jaskier packed everything back into the bag, scrubbing his hands with the same cloth he had used on Geralt before he scooted the stool back to the side to sit down again.

“How are we doing?”

Geralt didn’t answer; Jaskier was a little pink, his hair mussed from flopping into his knees, eyebrows raising almost expectantly. Adrenaline clung to his skin, too, sharp through that lingering sleepy smell, nowhere for it to go with only his hands moving slowly and steadily the whole time. 

Geralt didn’t realize he was leaning into it until his face scrunched, Jaskier’s hand at his chest pushing him back from the  _ spike _ in his shoulder, his hand grabbing Jaskier’s undershirt—

“Geralt.”

He felt the last of his name in Jaskier’s mouth.

He hadn’t grabbed hard enough for it to have all been him.

Jaskier’s hand didn’t leave his chest as his heartbeat sped by, as Jaskier kissed him, even when his nose bumped Geralt’s cheek as he broke away that tiniest bit. 

His breath was warm at Geralt’s chin, and barely any louder than that, “I’ve never seen you with men.”

“Or you.”

A deeper breath out; Geralt barely had to tilt his head to catch Jaskier’s lips again, still didn’t get to for very long, but Jaskier didn’t pull any farther away.

“You were delirious.”

“I’m not now.”

Geralt could feel the scrunch of Jaskier’s eyebrows furrowing together before there were a couple inches between them.

The candlelight flickered yellow over the dip of Jaskier’s collarbone with the top of his undershirt untied, over his face as he searched Geralt’s and lingered a little too long at his mouth. A little longer.

Jaskier’s hand was damp when he moved it from Geralt’s chest to cup his jaw and crossed those couple inches again. He was almost tentative that time, until a shiver at Geralt’s hand tightening in his shirt brought him too close to slipping into the water, his teeth catching at Geralt’s bottom lip as he braced his other hand against the tub.

Geralt didn’t get the chance to try to get up before Jaskier’s hand slipped down, their noses bumping again while he fumbled to roll his sleeve higher before his arm splashed into the water with a whispered,  _ “Oh…” _

Geralt had to stop himself from shuddering into Jaskier’s fingers circling around his dick, too close to another twinge in his shoulder. Jaskier pumped his hand once up and down before holding more firmly, no more hesitation or thought to how his cuff was still getting wet as he kissed him again.

It wasn’t enough, not with Geralt’s skin still buzzing and Jaskier’s hand stoking it even further, he wanted more—

Geralt didn’t manage to keep down the low rumbling sound in his chest when Jaskier’s thumb swiped over the head of his dick, his forehead bumping Geralt’s before he pulled his hand back too quickly for Geralt to stop him.

Geralt’s hand slipped from Jaskier’s shirt as he stood up, his shoulders lifting on a deep breath as he looked over Geralt and down into the water; he didn’t turn around to get the towel he had left on a hook by the door, took too long for Geralt to just sit there before he started to push himself up on the edge of the tub.

“Uh,  _ no, _ let’s not do that and ruin all of my hard work, thank you—”

Geralt told himself that he would have made it out fine without Jaskier catching his arm, a sharp huff with most of Geralt’s weight leaning against him again as Geralt took a wobbly step out of the tub.

Jaskier’s eyebrows twitched up with another deep breath out, a light squeeze with his hand still on Geralt’s arm before he swallowed and smacked the towel a little distractedly to Geralt’s chest.

“Going to get the bed wet,” he mumbled mostly to himself as he started to dry.

Jaskier let out a little choked sound muffled against Geralt’s lips at Geralt’s hand tugging at the front of his shirt again, his arms and the towel caught between the two of them; he was slow to bother wriggling his arms free, the towel barely an afterthought as his hands passed down Geralt’s chest, over his hips, lower.

“Oh,” he breathed out again, a firm squeeze with both hands making Geralt’s hips twitch before Jaskier nudged him towards the bed. “Lie—no, that’s a bad idea—”

It was only a few steps backwards before the backs of Geralt’s legs hit the frame, Jaskier stumbling to follow the pull to stand between his thighs as he sat down with a sharp twinge high on his back.

Jaskier’s hands hovered a couple inches above his shoulders with a shiver at Geralt’s breath hot at his collarbone, tugging Jaskier’s shirt from his waistband as high as he could get it without straining his arm before Jaskier pulled it the rest of the way over his head. It hadn’t even hit the foot of the bed before his breath hitched as Geralt wound his good arm around Jaskier’s waist, mouthing over where the hem of his shirt had just been covering, gingerly moving his other hand to Jaskier’s hip—

He didn’t get very far before he went stiff with a little shudder at the  _ tug _ in his hair pulling him back from Jaskier’s chest.

“Wait.”

Geralt held his arm around him a little tighter; Jaskier’s cheeks were pinker than when he had finished stitching Geralt’s shoulder, the feeling of his eyes raking down Geralt’s torso  _ heavy _ before he nudged Geralt’s thighs a little wider with his knee.

“Jaskier—”

“You’re just going to hurt yourself,” he said, settling to the floor with his hands sliding up Geralt’s thighs, “and  _ all _ my hard work, damages for a bloody bed, as if we have the money for that…”

Geralt barely had time to brace his better hand on the mattress before Jaskier ducked down to take him into his mouth. The sheet strained clenched between his fingers, Jaskier’s right hand covering where his lips didn’t reach as the other palmed back up Geralt’s thigh,  _ another _ squeeze with a hum that thrummed low in the pit of Geralt’s belly. 

Jaskier only pulled back to breathe in through his nose every so often as he kept bobbing his head, hollowed cheeks, right back to it until his lips met his fingers. Geralt slowly shifted his other arm, didn’t need Jaskier telling him off for not being careful when he had only just gotten him quiet about it—really didn’t need Jaskier taking his mouth off of him—and he almost didn’t manage to stop himself from tensing too suddenly at the light groan when he moved his free hand to Jaskier’s hair.

He didn’t move it when Jaskier pulled back with a cough, or let himself think too much about the heat in his chest at Jaskier leaning into his hand, his breathing heavy as he pumped his hand a couple times and looked up.

Geralt swallowed around something tight in his throat.

Jaskier’s eyes crinkled on a grin as a kiss to Geralt’s pelvis turned to mouthing over the base of his dick, up to dip down again before he started bobbing his head a little more insistently. He shivered between Geralt’s thighs tensing around him, snug, not enough room for Geralt not to notice him moving his left hand between his legs even as he shifted the other lower to cup his balls in his palm.

_ “Jaskier—” _

He didn’t follow the pull to his hair like Geralt found himself hoping he would have, his hand moving quickly below his waistband as the other and his  _ mouth _ coaxed Geralt a little too much a little too soon. Geralt didn’t have much longer before he had to stop himself from pulling too hard, the  _ snap _ of a thread in his other hand unnoticed as he bit the inside of his cheek, thin walls—

Jaskier pulled up and didn’t manage to catch his hand over the head of Geralt’s dick before a little come made it to the dip in his collarbone. 

His breathing was still heavy when he pulled his other hand from the front of his pants and sagged with his cheek against Geralt’s thigh for a minute.

“I need another towel.”

Geralt didn’t really notice his shoulder.

Jaskier pushed himself up with his hand braced on the bed almost touching Geralt’s thigh, his fingertips brushing Geralt’s knee as he stood and turned a little shakily to find another cloth; his back was still to Geralt, and Geralt still didn’t miss how Jaskier left his chest for last.

He didn’t realize his mouth was open slightly until it snapped shut when Jaskier turned back around.

Jaskier’s neck was still flushed a little splotchy when he tossed the cloth with the rest from earlier, another odd twist in Geralt’s chest at the stark difference between it and the others smeared with blood. Jaskier didn’t seem to notice or think anything of it when he looked from Geralt to his bag by the tub, digging through it again for a small jar of salve, and that mostly just made it twist harder.

“Is this the right one?”

“What?”

“For numbing that,” Jaskier said with a nod and a glance towards Geralt’s shoulder. “I don’t really think being unconscious counts as sleep and that seems like it could give you some trouble.”

“I wasn’t unconscious.”

“You weren’t really conscious.”

“It’s, uh. The other one,” Geralt said. “Kind of brown.”

Jaskier nodded and switched out the jars.

He twisted the top open on his way back to the bed, his nose wrinkling with a shuddery huff before he climbed up on the bed to sit behind Geralt. He hadn’t felt quite so bare until the feeling of Jaskier’s pants smooth against his thigh, one leg bent to get close to Geralt’s back with the other hanging over the edge of the bed next to him.

“And you’re still in one piece,” Jaskier said brightly, another little displeased  _ ugh _ as he dipped his fingers into the jar, up to Geralt’s back. “I’d say this turned out well enough…”

Geralt snorted, something warm in his stomach, before his breath stuck in his throat for a second at the chill of the salve; he glanced between his legs and quickly back up again, to the tub and the stained cloths, decided that wasn’t what Jaskier was referring to.

“Would you.”

He felt Jaskier’s shrug in the pause of his fingertips, circling a little wider around the stitches than he needed to on his way inwards, less pressure the closer he got. Jaskier stopped for a second to scoop out more of the salve before feather-lightly covering the two scabbing gashes.

“Well,” Jaskier said, giving Geralt’s other shoulder a squeeze as he slid out from behind him, “you live to inspire another song, I’ll take it.”

Geralt shifted uneasily where he sat while Jaskier packed his bags up again, shoving all the towels into a less messy pile and taking his shirt from where it had ended up tossed to the foot of the bed. His Adam’s apple bobbed on a thick swallow before he folded it more sloppily than Geralt would have expected from him and left it with the rest of his things.

Geralt didn’t say anything while Jaskier mumbled about how it would have been nice to have money for a second bed as he rolled out the mat and a spare blanket, Geralt could have told him the value of the creature’s teeth ahead of time, and he put up the twist still in his chest to the slowly fading ache in his shoulder as he lay down as comfortably as he could.

Neither of them mentioned it the next morning, or the next, or after that. Geralt could have left it as a fluke if he could forget the feeling of Jaskier between his thighs a little more easily.

He eventually had to believe that it  _ was _ a fluke, without anything solidly pointing to the contrary, back to their usual parting and finding each other again; it shouldn’t have felt like such a routine, such an ease to it that he didn’t know what to do with if he thought about it too much. Jaskier usually interrupted whatever silence had let him quickly enough.

Jaskier’s voice almost faded behind Roach’s hooves on the rocky ground and the threateningly damp wind blowing Geralt’s hair in his face even tied back, mumbling undecided lyrics while he picked at the strings a couple yards to the side. 

They had just enough money from the dispatching of a noonwraith for a room but little else, directions to another town nearby that had been having trouble, too, and Geralt’s armor had been needing some professional repairs for too long not to go.

“How far did they say this was?”

“It’s not much farther.”

Jaskier’s fingers stopped picking over strings with a light huff, a pause as he looked up before rushing a few steps to catch up with Roach. “Hold on a minute.”

“It’s not—”

“You said that the last time I asked,” Jaskier said, reaching up to a saddlebag behind Geralt for his lute’s case when he tugged on the reigns, “I’m not getting this rained on.”

Geralt looked up next just before his nose wrinkled at a  _ plop _ hitting his forehead.

He had to pull his hood up only a few minutes later, stopped again not long after for Jaskier to get his coat, enough blowing over by the time they made it to the next town that his hair was damp anyway.

Jaskier ran into the tavern before Geralt had dismounted.

Rain smudged the windows as he led Roach under an overhang to tie her to the post below it, but he could still see the shapes of faces through the glass, a couple cracked doorways, staring longer than could be justified by staring at anything but him. It really wasn’t a night he wanted to spend without a room if the clouds didn’t let up in the next few hours and no one wanted to give one to him.

Geralt hesitated behind the edge of the overhang, glancing at the runoff puddling at his boots and up to the door just as it opened.

“I already paid,” Jaskier said, waving Geralt over. “Hurry up, there are only a couple chairs.”

Jaskier ducked back inside without waiting for him to follow or any mention of why he had really gone in first. Geralt’s stomach tightened; he did really need to eat.

The rush of voices over voices hushed with the door closing behind him, as many sneaking glances as straight-on before Jaskier’s arm raised up, his mouth too full to get Geralt’s attention otherwise at the far wall. Chairs scraped closer to tables as Geralt passed between them to where Jaskier had already turned back to his plate.

“The ale’s kind of piss,” Jaskier said after a more sensible bite, pushing Geralt’s plate across to him, “but the duck’s just finished and it’s lovely.”

The conversation didn’t seem to come so easily around them even once it started up again.

There were a few stares that lasted longer than the others, and a couple that lasted longer than those, while Geralt ate and nodded occasionally at Jaskier before he looked up at the sudden quiet and Jaskier’s fork held across the table to him.

“What?”

“I asked if you wanted to try it,” Jaskier said, nodding towards a pot pie he had only gotten one of. “I couldn’t decide on getting two.”

“I’m fine.”

Geralt looked back down at his plate; the fork was a little closer when he looked up again.

“It’s good.”

Geralt kept looking at him for a second before taking the fork.

Jaskier was on his way to the counter for a second when a couple of those longer stares got up from their table, posture too straight not to be put on as the two men squeezed between the chairs.

“Witcher.”

Jaskier hadn’t seemed to notice when Geralt glanced over, his shoulders sagging a little; he could have at least finished his meal first.

“What is it?”

Jaskier kept his hood up with his lute under his coat, looking up at the sky more than once with a huff; the rain overnight had turned to buckets and kept them inside for most of the morning, until Geralt had to accept that the heavy drizzle it had eased into was as much as they could hope for if he didn’t want to pay for another night.

The next time Jaskier huffed, “You didn’t need to come.”

“I need details,” Jaskier said, speeding up a few steps to catch up with Roach. “You never give me much of anything.”

“You’re going to embellish either way.”

“And I need something  _ to _ embellish.”

Geralt’s nose wrinkled a little with a frown. Jaskier shouldn’t have come; he shouldn’t be seeing the details anyway, even if the long trudge felt a little less like a trudge, Jaskier still humming when he stopped talking.

The clouds were a little paler when Geralt eventually pulled back on the reigns.

“Wait here.”

Jaskier stopped a few feet ahead of him. “What’s here?”

Geralt dismounted and kicked a log to check that it was secure enough to tie Roach to before pointing through the trees. “The graveir was recently enough.”

“Then we could always wait where it  _ hasn’t—” _

“It won’t be back here before I am.” Geralt adjusted his sword at his back. “There are tarps in the saddlebag.”

Jaskier’s shoulders sagged when he looked up again.

Geralt lowered his hood a few trees past the path he had taken, the thick fabric dulling all the sound around him even more than the rain pattering against the leaves. His nose wrinkled again.

The snapped branches were barely damp, maybe less time than he had thought since the graveir had passed through; less walking, too, he thought, but he couldn’t help glancing back towards where he had left Roach and Jaskier.

The graveir wouldn’t be back before he was.

It took a few tries for Jaskier to secure a tarp between a few trees for himself and another for Roach, almost slipping from the rock he had to stand on before the last corner finally stayed put. He didn’t bother securing a second to have something dry to sit on underneath it.

He pulled his coat tighter around himself, the air more damp than cold with the wind finally dying down; his fingers tapped against his leg as he looked back to the snapped branches Geralt had followed, and then over again to Roach.

Roach blinked and turned her head away.

“And he acts like you’re such a conversationalist,” Jaskier said. “Do you just not forgive me for having to ride you that time I had to go rescue him?”

He frowned to himself and leaned his chin in his hands with his elbows on his knees.

“Maybe being out here too much just makes anyone start talking to horses…

It wasn’t much longer before he straightened up again; the rain hadn’t gotten any harder yet, and his fingertips were itching until he opened the case for his lute.

The clouds had gotten as light as it seemed like they were going to when Geralt unsheathed his sword from his back, until a splintering  _ crack _ under his shoe stopped him before he could put the rest of his weight into the step. Flesh still clung to the spine only partially covered by blown-over leaves, ribs snapped to get to the marrow of what had been a cow not more than a couple days earlier. The graveir wouldn’t be much farther away.

Geralt stepped a little more carefully until the trail led him to the mouth of a cave.

The stink coming from inside told him plenty; he decided against risking getting cornered.

Geralt walked back a little ways and hurled a rock to hit the edge of the cave.

It took until the third before he steadied his stance at a faint  _ thump _ under the soles of his boots, ready to pick up another if he didn’t hear anything else, but he didn’t have to before a snarl echoed through the hollow stone. 

Geralt tightened both hands on the hilt of his sword just as the hunched, broad shoulders and bony spikes came out from the cave, teeth gnashing as red eyes focused right on him. The smell, though…

Geralt’s shoulders drooped, straightening just before the first graveir began to bound across the suddenly too-short distance Geralt had gotten himself. The second that no one had thought to mention followed not far behind.

“Fuck.”

Jaskier looked up at a crack of thunder that he could have sworn had covered something else, but nothing else came when his fingers stopped on the strings.

He frowned, his eyes narrowing a little as he looked around before reaching for the case again; he had only just gotten it fastened when another howl shook through the trees,  _ another, _ the thunder definitely covering something earlier.

It didn’t sound too far off.

“What do you think?”

Roach just blinked at him.

Jaskier frowned again and looked off to the side. “He should be fine for now.”

It had been a while since he had remembered those stitches so clearly. If the rain hadn’t started hammering again, it would have been nice to have strings under his fingers instead of the phantom feeling of thread pulling through skin.

Jaskier wondered how long  _ for now _ would be after the state Geralt had been in that time; his ankles bounced, dragging his hands down his face with a deep breath out before he stood up.

“I’m not giving him stitches again…”

Geralt almost stumbled over the first graveir laying face-down not far from where he had first thrown the rock; the second had circled around just as he had ripped his sword back, no time to straighten before he had to swerve out of the way of blunt, blood-stained claws swinging at him.

Rain smeared his vision, the spikes and red eyes, metal crunching through flesh but nothing more than an arm before Geralt scrambled backwards a few feet. All he had was the smell and the shape of it, too blurred to see any features as he took another couple steps back to steady himself, but not quickly enough—

His arm burned through the lunge upwards. The graveir shrieked and stumbled back, the sharp twinge where the leather had torn an opening for it to charge him again with dark blood dripping.

Geralt’s ears rang with the  _ smack _ of his head against the ground. Claws scrabbled at leather, the point of his sword in the graveir’s shoulder blocking Geralt less than it frenzied the graveir, nothing to lose but to bring Geralt with it, before he  _ threw _ his weight sideways.

The hilt almost slipped from his hand as his sword tore from the graveir hurled off of him. The only way back from it was into the cave; it made a wet, raspy sound, unbalanced and even more hunched with its arm hanging limply below the deep wound, before it followed, Geralt’s eyes finally clear enough to see the graveir’s narrowing on him.

Geralt raised his sword.

Jaskier almost could have missed it, eventually, the sallow corpse lying in the mud through the trees, the blood almost soaked away by the rain trailing to the side. He hadn’t heard any more howling.

Jaskier opened his mouth to call out for Geralt, but it snapped shut at a thick  _ squelch _ he couldn’t see the source of before he got the chance to.

He had to hold his hood past his eyes to see Geralt coming out from the rockface—a cave—his sword in one hand with another ghoul’s head in the other held by a blunt spike at the top, eyes  _ inky. _

“Oh.”

Geralt’s head twitched almost unnervingly quickly towards him. “I told you to wait.”

“Yeah,” Jaskier said, looking from Geralt to the other corpse and back. “It sounded like you could use a hand.”

“I  _ said—” _

“I don’t remember anything about two of them—”

“So you wait,” Geralt snapped. “What do you really think you would have done if you were here ten minutes earlier?”

“Well,” Jaskier said with a shrug, “I wasn’t, and I was  _ thinking _ that it maybe wouldn’t be ideal to hang around if you were lying here mauled again.”

Geralt didn’t wait for him to finish before trudging past him to the first graveir, turning for an easier angle to hack into its neck before he grit back a wince at a tearing pain deep in his shoulder. He stopped, straightened, and then tried to stay that way as he let out a slow huff. His elbow and wrist could move well enough; all he got was that tearing feeling again with a slight shift at his shoulder.

“—not as if I was running straight into—”

“You wanted to do something?”

A couple seconds passed before Jaskier’s footsteps splashed to a few feet behind him; his jaw tensed a little as he turned his elbow to hold out his sword.

“I need proof that it was two if I’ve any chance of payment for two,” Geralt said. “Either that head or at least three hands.”

_ “What—?” _

“I can’t fix my shoulder in this,” he interrupted, giving the sword a little wiggle. “It’s just dislocated.”

He could hear Jaskier’s cringe in his mumbled, “Just dislocated,” before his fingers slipped the sword from Geralt’s. Jaskier stood there for a minute, looking from the sword to the graveir and back until Geralt nudged him.

“Is cutting off a head easier than cutting off three hands?”

There was too much rain in them for Geralt to roll his eyes; he had to think for a second. “Hands, probably.”

“What if I just take those, uh,  _ spike _ things, or are they—?”

“Just take the spikes.”

Jaskier cringed another few times while he hacked off and pocketed them, didn’t need to be told to sink Geralt’s sword into the ground to scrape off the blood before leaning up behind Geralt to sheath it again. He hadn’t said anything about Geralt’s eyes even when he clearly had seen; something he had to think was irritation itched hotly in Geralt’s chest.

“What are you doing about your—?”

Jaskier was cut off by a  _ crack _ of thunder.

“Not taking the time now.”

They didn’t have any to spare if they still wanted to get back to the town with the rain picking up again.

“So, how did this one go?” Jaskier asked when Geralt turned to pass him again, back up the trail of snapped branches. “You look mostly in one piece. Otherwise.”

Geralt grunted.

“No…?” Jaskier ran a few steps to stop in front of Geralt, a matching step to the side when Geralt tried to step around him before he reached up. “Oh, that stinks…”

Geralt grimaced as Jaskier pulled his hood back up, only a little wet inside from being pulled loose when he had been knocked to the ground.

_ “So,” _ Jaskier said again when he let Geralt pass him, looking back, but the rain was too thick to see very far through, “you were…ambushed, waylaid?  _ Assailed _ by a pack—”

“It was two and I was looking for them.”

“You’re welcome to pitch in if you’d like to give me any better details,” Jaskier said. “I think waylaid might sound better, someone might think I said  _ sailed, _ I’ve already got a couple wrong lines going around…”

Jaskier kept embellishing whatever details he decided he could gather or make up until the startle from a flash of lightning almost sent him slipping on a mossy stone, and then it was only another couple seconds.

“Oh,  _ shit.” _

He barely adjusted his hood in time before the drops felt almost bruising, heavy and plunking loudly around them, another  _ crack _ of thunder just after it as he started to run; Geralt’s shoulders sagged with a sharp twinge.

He let out a deep breath and started after Jaskier again.

The rest of the walk felt longer than the first time with his face soaking even under the hood, wind blowing the rain down the back of his neck. Jaskier’s relieved shout ahead of him was the only thing to show that he was almost there with the sheets of water pouring down between them.

“Yeah, you are glad I set that up, aren’t you?” Jaskier said to Roach, sliding his coat off with a heavy shiver under the other tarp. “Should’ve just stayed back there…”

Geralt dripped next to him and looked for a dry spot to leave the graveir’s head.

“That  _ reeks, _ do you not have something to put it—?”

“This isn’t letting up,” Geralt said. “We’re going to be here a while.”

The front of Jaskier’s hair dripped too above his nose wrinkling as he looked out from the tarp, up at the rain pounding down on it.

“We’ll need the tent.”

Jaskier’s face dropped to his hands.

He was soaked through by the time it was unpacked and upright, the tarp tied higher with a smaller one on the ground for the tent, not much Geralt could do with his right arm cradled against his chest aside from, “No, it’s that—it’s  _ that _ one, goes over there.”

Geralt waited on the rock Jaskier had been sitting on until Jaskier came to stand in front of him, his arms stiff a few inches from his sides with wrinkly fingertips.

“We should have stayed there.” He slid his coat off with a grimace, about to put it down on the rock before he shuddered at the head next to it and left his coat at Geralt’s other side; the rest of him was mostly just damp, rubbing his hands together to try to warm them before raising his eyebrows and nodding towards Geralt’s shoulder. “What’s being done about that?”

Geralt looked at his shoulder, down at the plated leather with a frown. “I just need to get this off.”

“And then…?”

“And then I put it back.”

Jaskier’s mouth pressed tightly together, a deep breath in and out before, “Alright.”

His fingers fumbled at first over the buckles, damp and cold, hesitating when Geralt flinched as he lifted the leather over his head. Jaskier hands were almost at his shirt when Geralt shook his head and started to push himself up, but he only made it a few inches before Jaskier rushed to stop him with a push to his other shoulder.

“Uh, no, where are you going—?”

“I need to lie down to fix this.”

Jaskier shook his head with a strained laugh, his nose wrinkling a little again at the way Geralt’s arm hung; it took a second before he pulled his hand back.

“I saw this once,” he said, “you know, doing it himself—he fell off a horse—and then he wasn’t getting as much use out of that arm anymore.”

“That isn’t going to—”

“If something gets pinched, you might have to take it out again.”

It wasn’t going to happen. Geralt leaned his usable arm on his thigh. “Where did you get that?”

“Someone I knew who fell off a horse.”

Geralt frowned when Jaskier ducked into the tent with one of the bags he had brought under the tarp earlier, a couple minutes of rustling before he crawled out again.

“That isn’t going to happen,” Geralt repeated. “With my arm. Witchers don’t—”

“Yeah, loud and clear, can you get inside alright?”

It wasn’t his most dignified; he had to sit first at the opening to the tent, scooting inside to keep from putting any weight on his arm, Jaskier putting no effort into keeping a straight face next to it.

“No, not lying down yet,” Jaskier said, shuffling in to sit behind him; Geralt swallowed around something hard in his throat at Jaskier’s knees bumping the back of his hips before the  _ pop _ of a cork pulled from a bottle. “Can you take your shirt off?”

“Not likely.”

“Mm.” 

There was a slick sound behind him, Jaskier’s hands rubbing together, before he tensed at Jaskier’s thumbs rubbing up the back of his neck.

“What are you—?”

“It’s not going to go in right if you’re all  _ stiff,” _ Jaskier said, circling over a knot at the base of Geralt’s skull, “which you very much…how do you even manage to dislocate anything with all that, uh, muscle…”

The corner of Geralt’s mouth twitched at the shiver he felt under the heel of Jaskier’s palm nudging his back.

“It got me against the wall.”

_ “Hm?” _

“Twice.”

His head felt a little less heavy on his neck as Jaskier worked his way down.

He had to stop himself from fidgeting.

“You don’t have to—”

“I don’t exactly have a lot of options,” Jaskier said; Geralt bit back a low sound at Jaskier’s thumb digging into another knot, “and you need your arm up and working again.”

Geralt wished he hadn’t thought of another option. He had managed not to for a while.

The smell of whatever Jaskier had put on his hands was familiar. Even without the tub, even without a room, the feeling was, too, the passive sense of Jaskier behind him and the tightness in his stomach. He felt bare again.

“This is fine,” he said eventually; Jaskier’s hands stilled but didn’t move back. “Don’t want to leave it any longer.”

“Do you need me to—?”

“I need to lie down.”

Jaskier scooted back with his legs crossed until Geralt had room to lie flat and then some, leaning over a little with his elbows on his knees. Geralt gingerly arranged his right arm bent above his head, turning at his elbow until his hand was at his upper back before slowly reaching to his other shoulder with a slow breath out—

“Oh, that was  _ loud.” _

Geralt’s arm bumped Jaskier’s knee as it slumped behind his head, a few deep breaths before, “It wasn’t that loud.”

He had felt the  _ pop _ more than he heard it, echoing down his arm.

“It was louder than I thought it was going to be,” Jaskier said. “How’s that feeling now?”

Geralt opened his eyes for the first time since he had reached for his shoulder. Jaskier was still looking at him until Geralt turned his eyes down, bumping Jaskier’s knee again as he tentatively shifted his arm.

“It’s where it’s supposed to be.”

He slowly brought his right arm down, pushing himself up with his other hand before Jaskier hurriedly shuffled forward with a hand at Geralt’s side.

“Hold on, you’re going to pull something—”

“It’s fine now,” Geralt said, but he still had to bite back a wince as he started to turn to nudge Jaskier out of the way. “You’re—”

“What happened there?”

Jaskier didn’t follow the nudge; his fingers hovered just above Geralt’s arm, a couple inches down from the shallow, scabbing punctures left by the graveir’s claws. 

“Nothing much.”

“You could have said something.” Jaskier looked up from Geralt’s arm to his face a couple seconds later. “Those things stank, that must be disgusting.”

Jaskier scooted back out of the tent, rummaging around one of the bags he had brought over while Geralt rubbed his shoulder and shook his head to himself.

“Take your shirt off.”

“I don’t—”

“That’s not going to roll up enough,” Jaskier said, waving towards Geralt’s sleeve as he came back in before looking over Geralt’s torso with a little twitch to his eyebrow. “Unless you need me to cut it off.”

Geralt swallowed.

“The sleeve,” Jaskier added, but it was hurried and halfhearted.

Geralt bit back a huff and pulled his shirt over his head, stiffening a little at the throb shooting through his upper arm. The leather had taken most of it, but he still needed those repairs, even if it wouldn’t scar enough to stand out much from the others. 

Geralt shifted sideways for Jaskier to reach his arm, scooting closer until his knee bumped Geralt’s thigh again with a rain-dampened cloth in one hand and a small bottle from one of Geralt’s bags; he wouldn’t have used it if he was doing it himself, not necessarily worth it, but he didn’t say so as Jaskier started dabbing at his arm. 

It was a quiet he didn’t want to break, just the rain pattering down overhead while Jaskier swapped the cloth for the bottle with a little huff.

“This again…”

Geralt turned his head slightly towards him.

“The last time,” Jaskier explained. “When you started swinging.”

“Sorry,” Geralt said before he realized that he had.

“If you could just avoid that this time, we didn’t have a tent to knock over then.”

Jaskier covered the lip of the bottle with a clean corner of the cloth before pressing it to Geralt’s arm.

It stung more than the claws had, gritting his teeth before he let out a deep breath when Jaskier pulled his hand back, no time to expect it again before,  _ “Hey—” _

“I’m almost done.” Jaskier smeared the cloth another couple times before putting it down with the bottle. “Hold your arm up for me.”

“I can do that myself.”

“Sure, but you don’t have to,” Jaskier said, “you’ve got the extra hands.”

Geralt looked off to the side while he lifted his arm, gentle fingers wrapping a cut strip of bandage around his arm, a couple times before tying off and tucking the ends in at the side and patting his shoulder.

_ “Now _ I’m done.”

Geralt’s stomach twisted a little again when he glanced down at his arm, more when he looked up at Jaskier, a smear of blood on the backs of a couple fingers with his hair curling slightly at his temples; the rain pattered a little less insistently.

It wasn’t like the first time. Jaskier’s eyes lingered too long at Geralt’s mouth again, but it wasn’t a grab, wasn’t hasty, Geralt’s hand on Jaskier’s knee as he tilted his head and Jaskier leaned in the rest of the way. 

It was longer than the first time, too, without the question behind it, Jaskier’s lips soft and so much warmer than the rest of Geralt’s face as his hand slipped a little higher to Jaskier’s thigh. His breath caught for a second but he didn’t stop, moving his hand up to cup Geralt’s jaw, before he pulled back when Geralt started to shift to face him more straight-on.

He was still close enough that his hair brushed Geralt’s forehead before he looked to the side, his hand slipping from Geralt’s face as he scooted back with a slightly breathless, “One second.”

“Jaskier—”

“You’re soaked,” he said from the opening of the tent, and from out under the tarp,  _ “I’m _ soaked.”

Geralt slumped a little while Jaskier rustled around outside the tent, jostling the side before he crawled back with an armful of a blanket and spare clothes, his other hand on the ground to keep his balance; it was the only thing keeping him from toppling into Geralt, more from the startle than the light pull to the front of his shirt.

The blanket dropped to the side, Geralt to his back as Jaskier followed, his knees bracketing Geralt’s hips as he leaned down to kiss him again. The ground was cold against his back under the tarp, but he barely registered it past Jaskier in his lap, his hand sliding up Geralt’s chest with a little hum low in his throat. His chest felt warmer inside than he would have thought Jaskier on top of him would have gotten from the shiver he felt when he slid his hands up Jaskier’s thighs again with a firm squeeze.

He did barely register the cold, but it could still be warmer, easier to notice his pants clinging damply to his skin with the front starting to feel a little tighter. 

He slid his hands higher, up to Jaskier’s undershirt tucked into his waistband until Geralt palmed up underneath it—

“Your hands are  _ freezing,” _ Jaskier said as he jerked upright, grabbing Geralt’s hands from his waist but not letting go; Geralt didn’t think to stop himself before linking their fingers together, the hem of Jaskier’s shirt still hanging over his wrists.

Jaskier wriggled slightly in his lap, the tip of his tongue poking out between his teeth as he looked down and up Geralt’s torso before letting go of his right hand to reach for the blanket.

“That just doesn’t look the most comfortable.”

Geralt pushed himself up enough for Jaskier to toss the blanket under him. He was barely flat again before he couldn’t help a little startled sound, Jaskier suddenly pinning his hand to the ground beside his head as he leaned in to kiss him again. Jaskier left his sore right arm alone, couldn’t have really held him there even if he hadn’t, but Geralt couldn’t help his hips twitching up into the couple inches between him and Jaskier.

It was unexpected; he didn’t mind the assumptions that came with looking the way he did when it came to that, but they didn’t tend to leave room for much else, couldn’t easily remember the last time someone had handled  _ him. _

Jaskier’s other hand was warmer than his must have been, dragging down his chest again to unfasten his pants. He loosely circled his fingers around Geralt’s dick without much room to move as Geralt’s hips jerked again, a little squeeze to Jaskier’s other hand still pinning his. Jaskier pulled back just slightly, his eyes crinkling on a grin at Geralt’s head tipping back against the blanket with a light groan as he pumped his hand a little tighter another couple times before straightening up.

Geralt couldn’t help letting out a short huff when Jaskier slipped his hand free, a few seconds before he lifted himself up from Geralt’s lap. His right shoulder still tender, Jaskier had to pull that side of his waistband down for him, both fumbling until he was able to shake off his pants with a kick that knocked the side of the tent.

Jaskier froze up for a second; nothing fell on them, nothing dripped, before Jaskier let out a deep breath as his eyes dragged over Geralt again. He settled between Geralt’s legs before Geralt had the chance to reach for him, sliding his hands up Geralt’s thighs without any pause on his way back up to his dick.

Jaskier scooted forward until his thighs were under Geralt’s, too close not to think of what more he could do like that, of what Jaskier’s skin would feel like against his instead of the fabric of his pants; Geralt shuddered into the warm pressure of Jaskier’s hand on him again, the other cupping his balls, twisting his wrist snug and quick.

“Jaskier—”

Jaskier hummed as he started moving his hand faster, faltering but just for a second when Geralt grabbed for his waist, not letting up for him to reach for more. “Let me take care of you.”

Geralt’s heart thumped, too much, too much, his mouth moving before he had the chance to think of what for, “Fuck me.”

Jaskier’s hand stilled, his eyes widening for an agonizing second while the rain pounding down might as well have been telling Geralt to  _ shut up _ before he had to bite back a low whine—not a whine, he didn’t whine—at Jaskier starting on his dick again.

“You’re injured.”

_ “Jaskier—” _

“Turn over.”

Geralt’s breath caught a little.

“If you, uh, can, your shoulder—”

Jaskier moved out of the way for Geralt to turn onto his front, leaving his right arm loose but he had only just gotten to his knees and an elbow before he looked back to see Jaskier climbing out of the tent again.

Geralt’s forehead dropped to his arm with a huff.

“Sorry,” Jaskier said as he came back in. “Or, not, we do need…”

He trailed off; Geralt was about to look back again before Jaskier gave his ass a firm squeeze as he came up behind him, his knees between Geralt’s. Still mostly dressed.

Geralt would have frowned if he hadn’t caught the  _ pop _ of a cork being opened over the white-noise sound of the rain, squeaking shut shortly after. His breath caught at Jaskier shifting forward until his thighs were against Geralt’s with another squeeze to his ass.

“It might be a little cold,” Jaskier said quietly even with no one to hear them, and Geralt waited, but nothing came until he nodded.

Jaskier’s fingers slipped slick over the cleft of his ass before slowly pressing his forefinger into him. He didn’t move until a tension released in Geralt’s back, didn’t realize he was holding it until Jaskier’s other hand kneading at his ass. It still wasn’t enough for much more than a tease as Geralt shivered against Jaskier twisting his wrist before pulling back to slip his middle finger in with the first.

He couldn’t remember the last time he had had that, either; it was rarely worth the difficulty and subtlety involved—it wasn’t a lack of paying attention, Jaskier saying he had never seen Geralt with men that first time—and when it was, it came with the same common assumptions as with anyone else. Geralt wasn’t enough in the practice of keeping his back to someone to have minded.

It had never come to mind with Jaskier.

Geralt told himself the comfort came in the fact that Jaskier wouldn’t be able to do anything even if he wanted to, no risk in getting pinned or letting his guard down, not lowered but  _ down; _ there was no threat behind Jaskier’s thighs flush against his, his fingers curling and sending a buzz through the pit of Geralt’s belly with each drag out and in again.

Geralt had to stop himself from reaching for his dick before his shoulder could twinge.

“Jaskier.”

Geralt couldn’t tell over a groan at Jaskier’s fingertips pressing  _ just _ there if Jaskier had actually shushed him; Jaskier kept his hand close to his pelvis, moving almost as if he was fucking him.

“You’re injured,” Jaskier repeated with an abrupt thrust forward, before again, “Let me take care of you.”

Geralt’s fingers knotted in the blanket with another sound he would never admit to, his chest tight, before Jaskier pulled his hand back to open the bottle again.

Geralt pushed back against Jaskier’s hand with a groan as he came back with three fingers that time; Jaskier gave just one more squeeze to his ass with his free hand before reaching under for Geralt’s dick, his elbow almost buckling as Jaskier started pumping his hand in time with his fingers. His hips bumped each time he pressed forward, just enough to jostle Geralt into his hand, speeding up a little with his fingertips pressing in tight circles again until Geralt had to bite down on a crease in the blanket.

Jaskier’s fingers almost stilled but not quite as Geralt came over his hand, another twitch in Jaskier’s palm before he slowly pulled back. Geralt shivered at the sudden empty feeling, still buzzing-warm and a little shaky as he stiffly let go of his vice-grip on the blanket, Jaskier’s breathing heavy behind him.

“I, uh…”

Jaskier cleared his throat after an uncharacteristically long silence and the feeling of his eyes on Geralt making the back of his neck prickle; the backs of his fingers brushed up against Geralt’s hip as he shifted back, his hand still sticky, before Geralt’s eyebrows wrinkled together as he looked back at Jaskier scooting out of the tent again.

“One second.”

Geralt slumped to the side of the damp spot on the blanket that Jaskier hadn’t caught with a deep breath out, dragging his hand over his face as Jaskier fumbled around outside the tent. There had been no rush to any of it. He still didn’t know how it had just happened.

His head felt too clear to be wondering about it so much.

He got up and flipped the blanket to the cleaner side.

Jaskier glanced back at the tent, but there was no movement, Geralt staying put while he cleaned his hands and hurried into a fresh shirt and dry pants, before he stood for a second with his shoulders a little slumped.

He would have to say something.

Roach snuffed at him, a little damp but still dry under the tarp he had set up earlier.

“I don’t know what you want me to tell you,” he whispered with a stiff shrug.

He looked back to the tent a couple feet away again, over it to the rain, lighter finally even though the sky wasn’t anymore; he pressed his fingers tight between his legs and let out a deep breath before hunching inside again.

Geralt couldn’t read his face as easily as he usually could as he shuffled over to make room, back in the dry pair of pants and shirt that Jaskier had brought in earlier. Jaskier sat for a second before lying on his back, too, their hands almost touching between them before Geralt looked over at him without turning his head.

Jaskier was already looking at him; his eyebrow twitched up when Geralt glanced down, no bulge to take care of, and he couldn’t help feeling a little disappointed—

“How’s your shoulder?”

“No worse than before,” Geralt said, and the corners of Jaskier’s mouth pressed into a smile before Geralt looked back up at the top of the tent. “I know you said.”

_ “Mhm.” _

The blanket shifted a little; Jaskier’s hand felt a little closer.

Neither of them spoke for a minute, a few heavier drips from the leaves above them plunking between the thin sound of the rain on the tarp, before Geralt turned his head to face Jaskier.

“Is this how you do it?”

Jaskier’s hair bunched up by his temple when he turned his head, too, his eyebrow raising again.

“Every time,” Geralt said, “I have to hear of some new trouble you’ve gotten yourself into in someone else’s bed.”

Jaskier snorted and looked away again. Geralt didn’t. He passed Jaskier’s hand, the backs of his fingers bumping purposefully against Jaskier’s thigh.

“Truthfully, I would have seen you being a little more selfish.”

Jaskier’s eyebrows shot up again with a huffed laugh and a mumbled  _ ouch, _ but his hand at Geralt’s upper arm stopped him from trailing any further along his thigh. He shouldn’t be doing much with that arm, anyway.

“I’m just saying that it makes a bit more sense now.”

“You always know how to give the most insulting compliments,” Jaskier said sweetly; he grinned a little wider when Geralt half heartedly swatted the back of his hand against Jaskier’s thigh.

He would have liked to do more.

There was still the dull ache in his shoulder, the feeling that that had passed, anyway, with Jaskier asking about it. He turned onto his other side.

“Throw the blanket over.”

He heard Jaskier swallow behind him, not much room for it, before he shuffled closer so his front was against to Geralt’s back but not close enough to feel snug, careful not to knock Geralt’s arm as he tossed the blanket around both of them.

Jaskier had to push Geralt’s hair out of his face with a mumbled, “Couldn’t have brought something to eat…”

“We’re leaving early.”

The rain didn’t sound like it was going to last.

Jaskier’s breathing slowed eventually behind him, longer than Geralt might have expected it to take, an arm slinging around his waist a while after that. Geralt couldn’t get his eyes to close, his throat tight as he stared at the slightly frayed corner of the tent; it wasn’t any sort of distraction from Jaskier’s nose squished against the back of his neck or his fingers curled loosely at his stomach.

Geralt squeezed his eyes shut with a grimace and didn’t get much out of it by the time the tarp was finally quiet above them.

He had had to pull the blanket back a few times before he eventually, slowly got up, leaving Jaskier mostly face-down and drooling a little as he crouched out of the tent with a shiver. The sun just over the horizon made it through the clouds more easily than the day before, thin fog hazing through the trees as Geralt dug through the bags Jaskier had brought over for something warmer to put on, before he looked around the little clearing.

Roach was only just blinking awake under her tarp. 

“I don’t know what to tell you,” Geralt muttered. “Don’t look at me like that.”

Once could be a fluke; twice was pushing it; three times was getting a little too close to routine.

They never said anything about it, only coming close in the occasional innuendo from Jaskier that could still be easily ignored. Geralt started to lose count eventually.

It always started the same, an injury easier to reach with a second pair of hands, help he didn’t need but wouldn’t turn down getting out of his armor or cleaning something else’s blood off of him. They parted afterwards most times, Geralt to a bed if they only had enough money for one,  _ you need it more than I do _ with a nod towards wherever Jaskier had patched up. 

Jaskier woke up once from his mat on the floor to find Geralt staring at the ceiling, his hands folded on his stomach and his hair too neat to have slept yet, even after days. Geralt just grunted when Jaskier asked; Jaskier didn’t say anything else as he came to the bed, and he didn’t leave after bringing Geralt a little closer to sleep with his mouth and his fingers. 

Geralt still never really got to touch him.

He didn’t think he would mind if Jaskier was a little more selfish with it. 

He didn’t think about it much, plenty else to focus on with Jaskier between his legs or at his back with his fingers curling Geralt to shaking; alone, though, sometimes, when they parted further before inevitably finding each other again, Geralt found himself wandering to what it might feel like with Jaskier under him instead, Jaskier’s skin under his lips or what he might sound like.

They kept finding each other again like they always did and Geralt still didn’t know.

The prickly haze of days days days without sleep was too thick to think through at all, too thick to have any patience or caution after he had hauled up net after net to finally find himself a djinn, until it snapped clear at the  _ swell _ in Jaskier’s neck and tight wheezing, his voice reedy and barely audible and nothing like what Geralt had gotten so used to.

Jaskier never should have followed him.

Jaskier never should have started following him.

Geralt’s chest twisted hotly as he yanked Jaskier steady and nudged Roach a little faster.

Geralt breathed in as he stared up at the ceiling before turning his head to the side.

Yennefer’s shoulders lifted sleep-slow and steadily with her back to him, no more of the frenzied tension to the way she had held herself right up until slumping next to him. He ignored the impulse to straighten where her hair had tangled a little at the back.

He looked back up at the ceiling again with another deep breath.

Geralt got up slowly to keep from jostling Yennefer, searching around for his clothes among the mess left from the rest of the building coming down above them. He stopped for a second with his shirt halfway on when she rolled onto her front with a little mumble, but that was it, and he finished getting dressed and found a usable door.

Yennefer stuck sweetly to his skin, in his hair, didn’t realize he was touching his fingertips to his mouth until he lowered his arm. 

He kept his hands to himself the next time and the next that he and Jaskier ran into each other. He had, selfishly, thought that letting his guard down was reasonable enough when Jaskier was the farthest thing from a threat that he had known in a long time; it unsettled him a little whenever he was reminded of that, that bare feeling, with Jaskier across a table from him or going into an inn first to get a room before Geralt could be turned away. He hadn’t thought before that he was letting down a guard between Jaskier and what he  _ did, _ too, what he killed only because it didn’t kill him first.

He kept his hands to himself, mended himself up well enough, and Jaskier didn’t push it.

Jaskier couldn’t help wondering if Geralt had just had enough; he had never  _ said _ anything, seemed perfectly fine each time Jaskier finished with him until there wasn’t anything to finish anymore. There had still been a sense of disappointment hanging between them, when there had been, just a little too heavily for Jaskier not to notice.

He would have said something.

He  _ would _ have, maybe, he liked to think, if they had ever actually acknowledged any of it—if Geralt acknowledged any of it—but eventually he had had to figure that it just wasn’t done. Not with Geralt.

Figuring it was easier than accepting it, especially when he had to accept that stopping wouldn’t be acknowledged, either, and it might have been a lot easier if Geralt didn’t keep  _ looking _ at him.

He didn’t look away immediately, cleaning one of his swords or picking the dirt from Roach’s hooves or just sitting, the same out-of-place softness around his eyes that Jaskier had only ever seen in the dark, before he would straighten his jaw and say something about Jaskier singing too loudly.

It made him itch.

He had to say something.

He  _ wanted _ to say something.

Jaskier wasn’t planning it; he wasn’t sure how to; there wouldn’t ever really be a  _ good _ time for it, he realized eventually, had to make one himself, but it was made for him when Geralt finally let go of the suddenly empty chain above the sharp drop down the cliffside.

Life is too short.

“Composing your next song?”

Jaskier shrugged and looked from Geralt to the steep, rolling hills, shifting his weight a little before he said, “Just trying to work out what pleases me.”

He didn’t quite get it sorted.

Geralt had to take stock of himself.

The air hung stiff and awkward across the table with a bowl in front of each of them, the son finally sent off for some chores after nothing else would stop him from asking Geralt about what he had come across or killed. Two helpings later, he started to think it was just him. He wasn’t entirely sure what to do with that sort of attention.

It wasn’t so much the attention as the warmth from the fire and a full belly and laughs that didn’t sneer, no motive for taking in the princess that he could find. It felt soft. It felt like what Ciri needed and still, “It isn’t going to be safe if we stay here much longer.”

Being out of the way wasn’t a guarantee.

It still took until his pants were sewn and a bag of food was packed up for them, some clothes too small for Zola for Ciri, before he lifted her up onto Roach and started away from the warm, soft house.

For all of his precaution in trying to get to Cintra for Ciri before Nilfgaard did, his promise that it was just a precaution, he hadn’t planned for it to have been needed; he had planned on there being somewhere to bring her back to.

Geralt’s was no life for a child, but it seemed like it was going to have to be.

He hadn’t thought much of Jaskier’s question, years ago, what he must want after hunting monsters without much point in thinking about it at all then. He wondered if maybe he should have.

Maybe Jaskier had had the right idea about going away for a while.

“How did you get here?”

Destiny, Geralt thought with a frown, but, “I was injured and that man helped me,” he said. “How did you?”

He glanced up when Ciri didn’t say anything at first, picking at the thumb of her glove with her mouth pressed tight; she dropped her hands in her lap and took a deep breath before she started telling him.

Geralt gave Ciri the seat with her back to the wall and the heavier plate of the two.

She didn’t look down at it as she ate, watching around the crowded inn over Geralt’s shoulder instead; she still ate a little more quickly than she had to after having to scrounge for most of her meals.

It was too noisy to be worth saying much with all the other voices clamoring over each other, chairs scraping against the floor and the clanking behind the bar and strings somewhere around the corner. Geralt had gone straight to a table to the side of the staircase, less open space at his back, and he didn’t realize he had paused with his spoon halfway up from his plate until Ciri raised an eyebrow, leaning up in her chair a little to see more past him.

Geralt cleared his throat and finished his bite.

“Do we need to leave?”

“No, finish your food,” Geralt said, and gesturing to the side of her plate, “Sprouts.”

He would have noticed Ciri mumbling about them being mushy and not very filling anyway; he only managed another bite before he turned, one voice familiar over the others, he was sure—

Ciri lightly kicked the table leg. “What?”

“It’s nothing,” he said as he pushed his chair back to get up. “Stay here a minute.”

Ciri’s chair still scraped behind him.

“We’re going to lose our table.”

It scraped back.

Geralt only went to the staircase, still easy to see Ciri if he just turned his head, nowhere for anyone to pass him without noticing. He didn’t need to go any farther to see the plush gem-green flashy behind everyone else’s clothes, sitting up on a table with his feet on a stool and a lute in his arms.

Jaskier didn’t stop singing, didn’t look up, until too far to the right over the crowd.

Geralt didn’t really need to try to stand straighter.

Jaskier had barely looked up from his hands before they froze for a second, stumbling over his words before he took a deep breath and looked firmly too far to the right again.

“Jaskier—”

He just sang a little louder.

It wasn’t one Geralt remembered.

His shoulders slumped as he looked back at Ciri, her eyebrows raising again before he shook his head and held his arm up.

“Jaskier.”

He looked that time but didn’t stop singing; his eyebrows were a little bunched, his mouth still moving enough that it almost covered the frown, but Geralt couldn’t think he had much time before Jaskier would look away again.

He pointed to their table, and then gestured towards the stairs, they had rooms, before someone bumped him coming down and broke the eye contact that Jaskier didn’t make again.

Geralt let out a short huff and went back to their table.

“Who’s Jaskier?”

Geralt hesitated a little too long; he wouldn’t have thought she had heard.

“Is that a friend of yours?”

Geralt stiffly picked up his spoon again. “I know him.”

“It seemed like he was ignoring you.”

Geralt’s shoulders slumped again as he looked up at her from his plate with a tight frown; Ciri shrugged.

Geralt took his time with the rest of his food even after Ciri had her elbow on the table and her chin in her hand, until the singing stopped, longer than just between songs before he twisted in his chair.

It was most of a minute before he saw Jaskier moving between the tables, not towards them, and he didn’t bother telling Ciri again to wait there before he got up and caught Jaskier not far from the door.

Geralt quickly dropped his hand at his side when Jaskier turned before he had to reach for him.

His eyebrows twitched, and his nose, before his expression settled into an irritatingly put-on politeness that didn’t really hide the way the corner of his mouth was still turned down.

“Haven’t seen you in a while.”

Geralt opened and shut his mouth again; he hadn’t thought that far ahead.

Jaskier’s eyebrow slowly raised up, glancing from Geralt to the door and back. “Did you need something…?”

“I’m sorry,” Geralt blurted out.

Jaskier’s expression slipped for a second, his eyebrows bunching like when he had first seen Geralt with a flash of tension to his jaw before his shoulders sagged a little. “Alright.”

“I—” Geralt cut off with a swallow, glancing back towards Ciri before he had to pull them both out of the way of someone coming through the door; Jaskier didn’t shake his hand off of his arm and it took Geralt a second to drop it, a second too long to find what to say, the conspicuous feeling of everyone else around them shrinking down everything he could think of. “I just need to talk to you.”

Jaskier looked off to the side with a slow breath out, the little wrinkle between his eyebrows again when he saw Geralt’s table. “Yes, you do. Is that—?”

“I can explain.” Ciri pretended to look interested in a chip in the corner of the table when he looked over again. “Give me a minute.”

Their rooms already paid for, Jaskier followed them up the stairs, into the second room from the end while Geralt brought Ciri into the next.

He almost didn’t catch the whisper before the door closed. “Can we trust him?”

Geralt’s voice carried too well to miss, “You could take him in your sleep.”

Jaskier squeezed his face between his hands.

Geralt checked that the window was secure and slicked the outside of the frame with oil to catch anyone trying to climb in, double checked the lock on the door and that Ciri had the knives he had given her within reach, about to leave, but.

“How do you know him?”

“He used to follow me around. He’s a bard. Do you need anything else?”

Ciri shook her head; Geralt wouldn’t have turned down an excuse for a little more time, a little more thought; he hesitated outside of the other door for a second, no indication that Jaskier had left, before he took a deep breath and pushed it open.

Geralt didn’t mean to explain Ciri first.

It might have just been easier to.

He wouldn’t have minded that taking longer, either, but Jaskier already had the background, nodding next to Geralt on the bed with his hands tight in his lap and his lute still strapped to his back.

“That’s…” Jaskier took and let out a deep breath; Geralt did, too, hadn’t realized he was holding it until Jaskier slipped the case over his head to put the lute next to him. “Certainly some good material.”

Geralt’s chest squeezed.

“Just before that,” he said, suddenly glad that they weren’t facing each other, “with…”

Jaskier nodded when he gestured towards his thigh.

“I thought I saw Yennefer,” he said, “and Renfri, and my mother.”

He felt Jaskier stiffen.

“That first time,” Jaskier said.

“Mm.” Geralt twisted his hands together in his lap before forcing them flat on his knees when he noticed he was doing it. It had been unsettling realizing that he had actually just seen Jaskier, that his mind had gone to her instead, more unsettling realizing that he had been relieved it was him. Geralt shouldn’t have been and he always was and that had always been the problem. “She asked me to get some water when I was small, and that was the last time I saw her until I made a habit of almost getting poisoned.”

The weak attempt at diffusing what he was really saying fell even flatter than expected. Jaskier just deflated next to him, a deep breath out, “Geralt—”

“No, that’s not what I’m trying to—” Geralt shook his head as he cut himself off. It felt like he was tripping over himself. “I would have liked to see you.”

He felt Jaskier’s eyes on him before he turned his head to see it, wide and uncertain with his hand so close to Geralt’s between them. There was only the noise through the floorboards for a few seconds.

“What do you want, Geralt?”

It wasn’t accusatory, demanding or impatient, might have been easier if it was, Geralt thought.

He didn’t know,  _ hadn’t _ known, this small, small part of himself deep under everything else that was still so  _ loud _ sometimes that his ears were almost ringing with it as Jaskier just kept looking at him.

He wanted that relief that he had had to accept was more of just a comfort.

“You,” he said. “If you would have me.”

Jaskier’s shoulders lifted slightly on a deep breath in; Geralt’s chest thumped a couple times before Jaskier looked down between them, his fingers twitching closer to Geralt’s thigh but not touching before he pulled his hand back to his lap again.

“You’ve got a really funny way of showing it.”

Geralt swallowed. It was another few seconds before Jaskier looked at him again, eyebrows raising.

“I shouldn’t,” Geralt said. “When you…”

The corner of Jaskier’s mouth turned down when Geralt glanced at his neck.

“You could have died,” he continued, “so many times, and it made me…” That hot feeling in his chest. He had thought before that it was anger. He had decided to think it was anger. “Witchers don’t really have friends because the ones who aren’t other witchers don’t tend to make it very long.”

_ “I _ made it that long.”

Geralt hadn’t realized he was still staring at Jaskier’s neck until he looked up.

“What’s changed?”

Nothing had; wanting didn’t dissolve responsibility, didn’t change who  _ what _ he was, but he wanted, he knew he wanted, the face he hadn’t seen while thinking he was close to dying but afterwards, when he was safe, wished that he could have. He could die at any time and he could do it without seeing Jaskier first but didn’t want to. His chest felt like it could burst.

It wasn’t just that he had to  _ make _ changes for Ciri.

“I was afraid.”

Jaskier’s eyes snapped wider, his shoulders a little straighter.

“I didn’t know how—I wasn’t used to…” Geralt bit back a huff. Jaskier’s hand lay a little looser between them; his fingers twitched again but didn’t move back when Geralt touched his to Jaskier’s. “It just felt good.”

“Then let it,” Jaskier said simply, before the glacial-slow stillness broke with, “and stop digging yourself into such a—”

He stopped almost like he had been expecting it when Geralt leaned in to kiss him.

It was a few slow, soft seconds before Jaskier’s fingers meshed with his, shifting closer until their thighs were touching, heart already racing. Geralt couldn’t remember kissing him like that before and wasn’t in a hurry to stop.

There was something in his eyes that Geralt couldn’t place when he reached his other hand over, breaking away for just a second for Jaskier to climb into Geralt’s lap; it was too far away even just next to him after so long, and never so close, without a wound to fix or any of the excuse behind it. Jaskier shivered at Geralt’s hands dragging up his thighs, his hips, winding his arms around Jaskier’s waist to tug him tight to his chest. Something else, though, between them, off somehow—

He didn’t realize he had hesitated until Jaskier abruptly pulled back and clapped his hand over Geralt’s mouth.

Geralt’s eyebrows twitched up; Jaskier’s eyes narrowed a little, questioning, before a cringe spread across his face, and Geralt risked a glance down only with Jaskier looking off to the side for a second before he said, “This is not how I normally do this.”

“Wh—?”

“Mm-mm. Hold on.”

Jaskier wiggled back a few inches when Geralt loosened his arms but not all the way, his finger tapping absently at Geralt’s jaw before he glanced back towards the door. Geralt frowned behind his hand and couldn’t help holding him a little tighter without thinking.

“My first entry into adulthood didn’t particularly suit me,” he said after a heavy few seconds, more stilted than Geralt was used to hearing from him, “so I went to find someone who could help me get a new one.”

Geralt’s eyebrows scrunched; Jaskier swallowed, uncomfortably still in his lap with his hand still over Geralt’s mouth while he put it together.

“You—” he started to say, leaving one arm around Jaskier as he moved Jaskier’s hand from his mouth, fingers loose around his wrist. It took him another second. “But you’re always—?”

_ “Yes, _ well, it does make things a little easier when most of your partners are less likely to take issue if they’re in an unsatisfying arranged marriage with someone who has his fun and calls it a night,” Jaskier said too quickly, “you know, you’ve said yourself.”

He had, even if he had forgotten, a little surprised that Jaskier hadn’t, but with the context, he supposed; his chest felt hot again in a way he didn’t find himself minding.

“And if they do take issue with it, it’s not like you can stay in one place too long without running low on inspiration  _ anyway, _ you can just—”

“Is that why you didn’t want me to touch you?” Geralt said quietly. “You couldn’t just?”

Jaskier swallowed again; he had to take a deeper breath to catch up with the rest of his words, some tension slipping under Geralt’s hand.

It was another heavy few seconds.

“It was never,” he said, but Geralt was already leaning, “nothing was ever a  _ just _ with you, Geralt.”

His name got a little muffled at the end as Geralt pulled him back in; his arm looped tightly around Geralt’s shoulders when he let go of Jaskier’s wrist, snug around his waist again, more of Jaskier against him than he had gotten to feel before pressed flush together. Jaskier’s breath hitched with a little shift in his lap, a little shiver, and neither of them wanted to break away long enough for him to speak.

“I was going to,” he managed, fingers tangling in Geralt’s hair, “I was going to tell you, if we left—”

He didn’t get any further before Geralt had to kiss him again. The heat in his chest prickled a little less pleasantly.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, gripping a little higher at Jaskier’s back, another tiny break with Jaskier shaking his head. “I’m sorry.”

“Stop.”

The kiss slowed until it was mostly just their lips touching, Jaskier’s forehead bumping Geralt’s with a slow breath out, fingertips rubbing warmly over the base of his skull.

“This doesn’t have to, uh…” His jaw tensed a little on a frown. “You—”

Jaskier shivered closer again under Geralt’s lips at his neck, holding him tighter for a second before sliding his hands back to Jaskier’s thighs with a light squeeze.

“I want all of you,” Geralt said, and with a kiss up to his jaw, “Everything you would give me.”

Jaskier let out a deep breath with a weak, startled little sound behind it, tangling in Geralt’s hair again to pull him back up.

“You can’t just,” he started, but he still didn’t stop kissing him between, “say things like that when you—sound like—”

He cut off with a shudder when Geralt reached back again to grab at his ass, still squeezing with one hand as he palmed up his side over his undershirt; Jaskier shivered under his hands so easily, every touch rocking him against Geralt with his breath hitching or another little sound that Geralt wanted to hear  _ more. _

Geralt hooked his arm around Jaskier’s waist again to bring him down to the mattress, his thighs tight at Geralt’s hips with a light groan as Geralt settled snug on top of him. He didn’t think he ever wanted to move from there. Jaskier’s arms wound just as tightly around his shoulders, holding him as close as he could get, but he wanted more, every night with those vague, thin flashes of what Jaskier’s skin would feel like and how he would move under him, too within reach.

Geralt got just enough space between them to slide his hand up Jaskier’s torso under his shirt, pushing it up on the way until he had to lean back, Jaskier’s breathing still a little heavy as he shrugged out of his top; Geralt got to his undershirt before he did, kissing up his chest as he pulled it up over Jaskier’s head before leaning in again to keep kissing him.

He didn’t get to for very long before Jaskier nudged at his chest with a muffled grumble, his other hand pulling at the back of Geralt’s shirt before Geralt tweaked his teeth over Jaskier’s lip as he leaned back on his knees.

Jaskier’s thighs were still propped over his, biting the inside of his cheek with a little twitch to his hips as Geralt slid his hand up Jaskier’s torso again, pulling his shirt from his waistband with the other. His eyes hungrily followed Geralt’s hands as he pulled it the rest of the way over his head, and Geralt was already on his way down again when Jaskier reached for his hips with a low hum.

“That’s a sight for sore eyes,” he mumbled against Geralt’s lips, but it went right past him behind Jaskier’s skin warm and soft and unscarred against his, a light groan at Geralt settling with a little more weight against him before his hips twitched again.

Jaskier’s breath caught a little when Geralt pulled back a couple inches, his eyes crossing slightly with their noses still almost touching; Geralt leaned on his forearm as he trailed the backs of his fingers down Jaskier’s side, almost to his waistband, before kissing his jaw and down his neck and he didn’t know what he had ever done to deserve the soft  _ oh _ buzzing Jaskier’s throat under his lips.

He liked how Jaskier’s thighs felt around him so much it almost felt selfish somehow.

“I want to taste you.”

Jaskier’s breath caught again; he hadn’t glanced back from the oil lamp in the corner quickly enough for Geralt not to notice when he looked up at him. Jaskier noticed, too.

“That won’t make much difference for you.”

Geralt shook his head. “If you wanted.”

He leaned up a little when Jaskier didn’t say anything for a couple seconds, just looking at him, before he found whatever he was looking for and his eyes crinkled on a grin as his thighs loosened at Geralt’s sides.

“Okay.”

_ “Okay.” _

“Geralt—”

Geralt ducked down again to cut him off and Jaskier didn’t seem to mind.

Geralt felt him take a deep breath in as he kissed down Jaskier’s neck again, fingers tangling loosely in his hair by Jaskier’s collarbone and tighter with a shiver as Geralt made his way down Jaskier’s chest. He took his time until Jaskier was squirming a little under him, a faint pink spot a few inches below his collarbone once Geralt leaned back on his knees.

Geralt hadn’t gotten to see him flushed like that before as he slid his hands down and back up Jaskier’s thighs, hesitating at first before holding his left hand at Jaskier’s hip and turning his wrist to press his fingers between Jaskier’s legs.

_ “Mm.” _

Jaskier’s head tipped back a little, his hips twitching again as Geralt rubbed his fingertips over him in tight, slow circles. He flicked Jaskier’s waistband open with his free hand, didn’t want to stop, but he couldn’t get much further before he had to eventually; Jaskier’s hips tried to follow his hand as he pulled back, squeezing at Jaskier’s thighs again with a low hum before he started tugging his waistband down.

Jaskier had to bend his knees up close to his chest for Geralt to pull his pants down his ankles without getting out of the bed, tossing them to the side on his way up to kiss him again. Jaskier shivered under his lips as he kissed back down his torso, palming along his sides and his hips on his way down. Jaskier tensed a little at the kiss to his inner thigh and a little more when Geralt stayed there until there was another mark to match his collarbone.

He only looked up from it after a soft whine above him and Jaskier’s fingers tangling loosely in his hair again; it looked like he was biting the inside of his cheek, his breathing quick and a little heavy, and Geralt didn’t look down again with another kiss to his thigh before he came up the last few inches.

He hadn’t really known what to expect and hadn’t really minded. Jaskier’s clit fit perfectly in the curl of his tongue, thicker than he had known before and firm with a light pull to his hair and a breathless,  _ “Oh, _ you’ve…”

Geralt hooked his arms around Jaskier’s thighs to tug them over his shoulders and sucked.

Jaskier bit back a groan, his other hand grabbing for Geralt’s arm with another shaky twitch to his hips as Geralt held a little tighter, warm at either side of his face. Geralt let him rock up against his mouth, easily and  _ comfortably _ settling into the slow, lazy feeling of bobbing his head slightly with his lips pursed tight and nothing else he could think about or want to past Jaskier’s thighs over his shoulders or his hand in Geralt’s hair. 

It was a little muffled with his ears mostly covered, but he heard it well enough, a low, “I was an idiot.”

Geralt hadn’t realized he had closed his eyes until he looked up at Jaskier again, already watching him, didn’t stop mouthing between his legs.

Jaskier’s fingertips rubbed over the base of his skull. “Could have had this the entire time I was fucking you.”

Jaskier’s hips twitched again when Geralt couldn’t help a light groan buzzing against him, his breath hitching as Geralt started sucking at him again; he hadn’t thought far ahead enough to his pants beginning to feel too tight when Jaskier’s had been more on his mind.

Geralt’s chin was starting to feel damp when Jaskier pulled a little harder at his hair, enough to get his attention, squeezing slightly at his arm.

“Geralt.”

He dragged his tongue flat and didn’t miss the way Jaskier shuddered on his way to kiss his other thigh.

“Come here.”

He let Jaskier’s thighs slip from his shoulders as he followed the tug up to kiss him; Jaskier dropped his hand from Geralt’s hair to hook his arm around his shoulders, his other hand palming hungrily down his chest to get to Geralt’s waistband. He didn’t want to stop kissing him until Jaskier’s thigh nudged his side.

“You know, I can’t really—”

“Mhm.”

He just needed a minute.

Geralt had to lean on his side to push his pants down without getting up again, biting back a huff as he kicked them down with Jaskier’s fingers absently trailing through his hair again; there had to be a less awkward, unenticing way to do it, he was sure, but the thought was gone as soon as he looked up again at Jaskier’s eyes crinkling again before he came back up to kiss him.

Jaskier’s breath hitched again when Geralt settled snug on top of him, his dick pressing between them as Jaskier slid his hand down Geralt’s back to squeeze at his ass. 

“Geralt—”

He cut off with a whine when Geralt dipped down to mouth along his neck, his thighs tensing at Geralt’s hips and his heart pounding under his lips before he leaned back slightly, bracing his arm by Jaskier’s side as he reached down to steady himself. Jaskier shivered at the tip of Geralt’s dick rubbing against him, slick as he started to press forward, tried to press forward, but.

“Hold your legs a little wider.”

“I  _ am.” _

Geralt bit the inside of his cheek to stifle a huff against the side of Jaskier’s neck before he leaned up a little more, a  _ little _ more, but again; he let go of his dick to slide his fingers between Jaskier’s legs, curling into him, Jaskier’s hips rocking up against his hand before he swatted at Geralt’s wrist.

“We don’t have to—”

“No, no, just, move over, lie down,” Jaskier said, nudging him onto his back to climb into his lap; Geralt slid his hands up his thighs again as soon as he settled over Geralt’s hips, so close, one hand at Geralt’s chest as he started palming over his dick with the other. “Not one to…give up at the first sign of adversity…”

Jaskier’s mouth pressed into a tight frown when he looked up to see Geralt’s eyebrow raised a little.

Jaskier shook his head to himself, the crinkling around his eyes still giving him away as he lifted up on his knees a few inches. Geralt’s chest warmed at the little wrinkle scrunching his eyebrows as he held Geralt’s dick underneath him, the tip of his tongue poking between his teeth, before Geralt’s fingers tensed at his hips as he started to come down.

Jaskier settled  _ hot _ around him into his lap with a faint whine, slow, inching back up a couple times before he was finally seated; his fingers twitched at Geralt’s chest, his breathing measured but heavy as his thighs squeezed at Geralt’s sides with a little shift that made Geralt’s hips jerk before he could stop himself.

Jaskier bit back a faint groan, his eyes flickering mostly shut before he started rolling his hips. He didn’t lift up far each time, just enough for the ropes holding the mattress to squeak when Geralt bent his legs to thrust up into him a little, but it had always been Jaskier doing all of the work. It didn’t have to be.

Jaskier didn’t seem to notice Geralt’s hand leaving his hip to brace his forearm on the bed, the other looping around Jaskier’s waist to hold him steady and close as he pushed himself upright; Jaskier let out a startled yelp that slipped to a groan as his arm gripped tight around Geralt’s shoulders, Geralt’s at his waist the only thing keeping him upright as Geralt started to rock into him.

_ “Oh, _ that’s—oh—your  _ arms, _ Geralt, do you even—”

He trailed off with another whine when Geralt pulled him closer to kiss along his neck, his other hand in Geralt’s hair and tighter when he gently bit down. Jaskier shivered at Geralt’s nose brushing along his collarbone on his way to kiss down his chest, again with a low moan as Geralt mouthed over his nipple until it was flushed before leaning back up to kiss him.

He only pulled back for a second as he turned to drop Jaskier to the bed, right back to kissing him as Jaskier spread his thighs a little wider for Geralt to come back. Geralt didn’t stop kissing him as he leaned up a few inches, Jaskier’s hips already angling up as he reached down between them, only when Jaskier’s head tipped back again with a groan as he pressed into him again.

Geralt didn’t mind getting to watch.

The flush had spread over Jaskier’s cheeks, his hair mussed and his eyes half-lidded and a little glazed as Geralt rocked into him. Geralt would have stopped him from clapping his hand over his mouth if he trusted the walls more as he started to pull back farther, a low groan Jaskier couldn’t hold back each time Geralt thrust forward again, his hips beginning to feel damp with Jaskier’s thighs shaky at his waist. 

Geralt didn’t slow down as he reached between them; Jaskier’s thighs squeezed tighter with a breathy moan as he started circling his fingers over him, his hips twitching up into Geralt’s hand between each thrust into him. Geralt felt him tense a little, and then again, again, biting back a whine when Geralt dipped down to his neck again and rubbed over his clit with a little more pressure.

_ “Oh—” _

Geralt muffled a groan against Jaskier’s shoulder as Jaskier’s ankles locked at his lower back, keeping Geralt close as his whole body shuddered underneath him with another light moan; it took a minute before his hand slipped from over his mouth, his thighs still trembling a little as they finally loosened at Geralt’s waist.

Jaskier’s breath hitched when Geralt’s nose bumped the side of his neck on his way to kiss his jaw, up to his mouth. Geralt started to pull back, about to reach for his dick before Jaskier grumbled and nudged his ankle against Geralt’s thigh.

“No, no,” he said quietly, low and a little rough, his arm slow to loop around Geralt’s shoulders. “Where do you think you’re going?”

Jaskier only let him go far enough to prop himself up with his forearm by Jaskier’s side; Geralt slid his other hand down to knead at Jaskier’s hip, but Jaskier’s expression didn’t get any less pleading, his fingertips rubbing at the nape of Geralt’s neck.

Jaskier’s eyes slipped shut with a faint groan and a shudder as Geralt eased into him again.

There was the same look to them when Jaskier opened his eyes again that Geralt had only ever seen when Jaskier was fucking him, almost greedy but with a sweeter sort of wanting behind it; his legs were still a little unsteady as he squeezed his thighs at Geralt’s hips, shakily rocking up against him with each short thrust forward before his fingers knotted in Geralt’s hair again with a whine as Geralt pulled him closer to kiss down his neck.

“Yeah,” he murmured, and Geralt didn’t manage to stifle a soft sound against Jaskier’s shoulder as he slid his other hand down Geralt’s back to knead at his ass. “Oh, that’s beautiful, you’re beautiful, please.”

Jaskier’s breath hitched again when Geralt bottomed out one last time, his face pressed to the curve of Jaskier’s neck, rocking against him without pulling back until he slumped slightly on top of him with a deep breath out.

Jaskier gave his ass one more little squeeze before winding both arms tight around his shoulders; Geralt’s chest felt warm.

He pressed a light kiss to Jaskier’s neck, his jaw again, before Jaskier turned his head to kiss him back as he shifted to Jaskier’s side. Jaskier’s ankle bumped his as he stretched out his legs with a low hum.

Geralt had forgotten about the noise from below them drifting up through the floor. It surprised him a little.

Jaskier’s arm was still loosely around Geralt’s shoulders when he pulled back, his cheeks still flushed as he reached his other hand over to swish Geralt’s hair out of his face. His fingers were so gentle in Geralt’s hair and brushing behind his ear, his thumb over the scar above Geralt’s eyebrow, that he almost didn’t know what to do with himself until Jaskier said, “Are you going to get me a towel?”

Geralt just leaned up to kiss him.

Jaskier let him for a minute before nudging at his chest with a grumble, reluctantly pulling away to push himself up; he didn’t look quite steady, legs a little wobbly as he looked around for a cloth. Geralt turned onto his side with his head cushioned on his arm, knew he was staring and couldn’t help himself as Jaskier wiped between his legs with his back still turned.

_ “Oh, _ little messy…” he mumbled, but Geralt could hear the grin in his voice even before he tossed the cloth away and turned again to come back to the bed.

He hesitated for a second sitting at the edge of it, glancing between where his shirt and his pants had been haphazardly dropped, before he startled at Geralt tugging him back down by his arm.

Something had faded to leave the question clear behind it.

Jaskier looked at him for a minute, lingering a little at his mouth, both taking a breath to speak but Jaskier getting there first.

“What have you been doing with her this whole time?”

Jaskier nodded towards the wall they shared with the room Ciri was in.

“It’s complicated still,” Geralt said, looping his arm around Jaskier’s waist; Jaskier’s eyebrows twitched like he hadn’t been expecting it and Geralt held a little tighter. He wanted to make Jaskier expect it. “I’m trying to keep her out of sight. Not much else to be done right now.”

Jaskier nodded and inched closer. He still smelled heady and warm when Geralt tilted his head to kiss below his jaw, a little shiver.

“Come with us.”

Jaskier froze up for a second, already looking at Geralt when Geralt looked up at him.

“Really.”

Geralt nodded.

Jaskier pulled him up to kiss him before he could even see it coming.

He didn’t stop for a while, and Geralt didn’t want him to, until Jaskier had shifted onto his side to face him and pulled back still close enough for Geralt to feel his breath against his chin. 

“Where are you going?”

Geralt shrugged, thought for a second, rubbing his thumb over Jaskier’s hip. He had an inkling. “Where do you want to?”

It felt like Jaskier had the same idea when he leaned in to kiss him again with a soft  _ oh. _

Jaskier only protested a little when Geralt told him he had to get up so he could push the bed against the wall and put out the lamp. He hadn’t at all when Geralt pulled him back, unsure if Jaskier had forgotten or just didn’t care that Geralt could still see him looking as they settled under the thin blanket.

Jaskier kept looking with his cheek a little squished against the pillow, over Geralt’s chest and his face and down his arm slung loosely over Jaskier’s waist, until Geralt felt his breathing slow a little while after he had last closed his eyes.

Geralt didn’t yet.

The mark below Jaskier’s collarbone had settled into a nice pink; he wondered if the one at Jaskier’s thigh had, too. 

His eyelids were starting to feel heavy when he realized how long it had been, past when he normally would have checked up on Ciri. He scooted up a couple inches, slow to keep from disturbing Jaskier before he thumped his fist against the wall three times.

He did it another three after a minute with no response before three thumps back and, “I was just sleeping, Geralt.”

Geralt knocked his knuckles twice again as he lay back down.

“You don’t have to keep doing that every night, you gave me a knife!”

“What’s happening?” Jaskier mumbled, his face blearily scrunched as he started to push himself up before Geralt tugged him down again.

“Nothing.”

Jaskier grunted and nudged Geralt onto his back to tuck himself against his side. “You’re fucking loud…”

Geralt looped his arm around Jaskier’s shoulders with an apologetic squeeze.

He had meant for it to be, but something itched at him, without his usual habit of trying not to think too much about what he was doing with Jaskier. He had been doing it for a long time.

A  _ long _ time.

It took him a second to put together Ciri’s age and then some, Jaskier coming to his table with his pants full of bread another few years before the betrothal feast, with little more than the crow’s feet Yennefer had mentioned to show for it.

“Jaskier.”

He just grunted.

With a little shake, “Jaskier.”

_ “What?” _

“How old are you?”

“That’s just rude,” he mumbled, mushing his face against Geralt’s chest before he huffed at Geralt poking his shoulder. “I swear to—”

“Who did you say you went to?” Geralt asked, running his free hand down Jaskier’s side when he looked up, eyebrow raised. “With, uh…”

Jaskier shrugged and settled against him again. “Some mage, someplace, it was ages—”

“You went to a  _ mage?” _

“Who else would you expect me—?”

“You went to a mage,” he said, “and you don’t look any different than when we first met.”

“Maybe your memory’s just bad.”

“No, it isn’t.”

“I don’t see what—”

“Just,” Geralt said, pulling Jaskier up to kiss him, a little startled sound muffled against his mouth, “damn foolish…”

“I—hey, mm—excuse me—?”

Geralt shook his head and kissed him again, slow and sleepy, didn’t stop for a while.

He didn’t notice he had dozed off until his eyebrows scrunched together with a frown at the wall.

Jaskier’s arm was loose around his waist, snug against his back with his nose at Geralt’s shoulder. He couldn’t really put out the impulse to listen around the rest of the room and wouldn’t have expected to need to.

He had almost forgotten what it felt like with Jaskier at his back, and the frown smoothed out. It just felt nice. It didn’t leave him feeling so bare anymore.

The sky outside the small window was dark but starting to pale at the horizon, still quiet below them as Geralt tentatively covered Jaskier’s hand with his own, letting their fingers link loosely together at his belly before he went stiff at Jaskier stirring behind him.

Jaskier held his hand a little tighter with a mumble against his hair before he could have let go.

The mumble turned into a kiss at the back of his head, behind his ear as Jaskier shuffled closer. He felt Jaskier’s smile against his skin when he couldn’t help tilting his head a little for Jaskier to keep kissing his neck with a light squeeze to his hand.

They didn’t get up for a while, sleepy touches and nudging Jaskier’s face away until he cleaned his teeth, and Jaskier was quick to come back to the bed after finding a bottle of oil.

The light through the window was still dim when Jaskier gently nudged him back to lie flat, sitting close between his legs with Geralt’s thighs over his, sliding his hand up Geralt’s chest as he leaned down to kiss him; the other was already slick as he palmed over Geralt’s dick before leaning back again, switching hands to press his forefinger into him.

And then the next, and a third, his hips rocking a little against Geralt’s as he pumped his wrist and his hand until Geralt had to bite back a moan as he came over Jaskier’s fingers.

Jaskier didn’t move away yet, even once Geralt’s breathing had steadied and his fingers stopped tingling enough to reach for Jaskier’s arm.

“Hold on a minute…”

Geralt’s nose wrinkled in almost a wince as Jaskier pulled his hand back; he wouldn't have minded him staying a little longer, but he minded it less when Jaskier came back soon enough with his hands clean and no pause when Geralt pulled him back down.

It was still early, still quiet on the other side of the wall when Geralt tugged Jaskier back on top of him, shivering even closer at Geralt’s hands dragging down his sides to palm at his ass. He only leaned up enough for Geralt to slip his hand between them, between Jaskier’s legs, his breathing heavier as Geralt circled his fingers tight and quick until Jaskier’s forehead dropped against his shoulder with a stifled moan as his hips twitched against Geralt’s hand.

Geralt wouldn’t have realized how much time had passed without the sky thoroughly blue by then through the window behind Jaskier’s head before Jaskier leaned up again to kiss him.

There wasn’t much more putting it off; he almost expected the same stiffness to the air as they quietly avoided looking or thinking too much while they gathered their things and got dressed again, every other time before that, but they had never said anything every other time. It was just a quiet without anything that needed to be said anymore until, “You  _ popped _ a  _ seam.” _

Geralt looked up from fastening his pants to Jaskier holding up his with a little pull at the side near the waistband.

“Never actually had that happen before…” Jaskier mumbled, but it still sounded a little smug as he pulled the thread tighter to tie off enough that it would hold for a while.

“Sorry.”

“I could think of worse ways.”

Ciri was already dressed and packed when Geralt knocked on her door, her eyebrow twitching up a little when she glanced behind him to Jaskier.

“Is he coming with us now?” she whispered; Jaskier pretended to be busy adjusting his lute at his back.

Geralt nodded.

They packed up some more food from the tavern to bring with them, Ciri still glancing back occasionally while they went out to get Roach.

“I can’t imagine we’ve been introduced properly, since I can’t imagine he would have,” Jaskier said with a hand held out. “I’m Jaskier and I make his reputation.”

Ciri looked from his hand to Geralt before he nodded again and she shook it. “Ciri.”

Geralt hoisted her up onto Roach, one hand loose on the reigns with Jaskier a couple feet behind him. It wasn’t long before he had to run a few steps to catch up after taking out his lute, absently picking at the strings, not much longer after that before, “Where are we going?”

The light tune didn’t stop but the back of Geralt’s neck prickled with the feeling of Jaskier’s eyes on him.

“Have you been to the coast before?”

Ciri shook her head.

“Thought we could go there.” 

**Author's Note:**

> @przyjaciele on tumblr


End file.
